So long Tucows and thanks for all the downloads

There’s a good chance if you’re under 40 you probably have no idea what Tucows is, but for those of us riding those early internet waves Tucows was a god-sent providing mirrored, “high speed” (think 28.8kbps modems here) downloads for the most popular software available.

Originally a BBS (yeah that’s going even further back into the dark ages) Tucows Downloads was founded in 1993 and has a long history and admiration amongst internet users throughout the late 90s and early 2000’s.

Whilst the site has continued on Tucows the business has expanded significantly and has reinvented itself as the world’s second largest domain name seller as the sole owner and operator of Hover.

They’ve also expanded into the physical world with Ting Internet, a fibre-optic network provider in the US that can hook you up to Gigabit speeds in certain cities starting at just US$89/month. If only we had a country-wide network in Australia that could offer that?!

The point is, I’m old, Tucows Downloads is gone, but Tucows lives on as a corporate overlord of domain names and optic fibre.